A Study on the Audience Perception towards Portrayal of Women in Indian Television Commercials

The social position of women has improved enormously over the last decade. With a few exceptions, advertisements have not done justice to this social change. Women are portrayed in unrealistic settings. Proper representation of women in advertisements leads to appreciation of women in the society. The key purpose of this research paper is to understand the perception of audience towards the portrayal of women in Indian television commercials. 124 male and female respondents indicated their general perceptions towards the present study. The results presented here showed similarities with the perception of the respondents of many international studies. From the present study it is clear that the respondents perceive women in decorative and family roles more than that of a working professional. The key potential contribution of this study is that it draws its sample from the Indian Tamil Television commercials of which not many research has been carried out.